


Bird Passing Through

by Savageandwise



Category: The Beatles
Genre: Angst, Drug Use, Drugs, Eventual Smut, M/M, McLennon, Mclennon big bang 2017, Not a death fic, Really. No one is dead., This is a canon fic, Violence, animal cruelty, general trippiness, psychedelics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-06-03
Packaged: 2018-10-30 03:47:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10868421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Savageandwise/pseuds/Savageandwise
Summary: "They say when a bird flies into your house through one window and out another it's a portent of death."John's trip in the aftermath of Paul's moped accident in late December 1965.Fear not,  this is not a death fic.Written for the Mclennon Big Bang 2017.





	1. The Come Up

_(They say when a bird flies into your house through one window and out another it's a portent of death.)_

  


The bird flew in through the bathroom window the morning after Boxing Day, causing Cyn to jump from the bathtub in hysterics.

Normally John might have found that amusing but he'd woken up with a hangover that morning and he'd been dreaming of Liverpool. The dream had been so real he could still smell it. The damp, like the inside of a consumptive lung, the nut-like smell of hops, the sweetness of rotting fruit, the underlying scent of the rain and Paul's cologne: sharp, green, made of longing and nights spent in strange beds.

John had had this dream before. Walking alone, desperate to find someone who was bent on remaining elusive. Generally, the setting was Blackpool and he was a boy again, searching for Julia in a crowd of umbrella carrying strangers; her red hair the only bit of colour in a grey in grey world. He knew that it wasn’t Julia he was searching for in this dream.

A figure, always ahead of him, moved away at a clipped pace. He couldn’t see clearly through the rain but he knew who it was. He would recognise him blind; his step, the line of his shoulders, the click of his boots against the cobblestones in the street.

“Paul!” He called out.

Paul turned to face him, his brows arched high in surprise, his soft mouth soundlessly forming John’s name. John’s cry startled a flock of pigeons underfoot and the birds took wing in every which direction, beating themselves against him as they hurtled towards the sky. He lost sight of Paul in the frenzy of feathers and claws.

John woke, his heart shuddering in his breast; a cold, clammy feeling in the gut. The real world appeared in dribs and drabs while the dream world faded to black.

Cynthia’s scream was the next thing he heard before the bird sailed in low through the bedroom door. He could hear its wings flap in stereo and for a moment John thought it had flown in from his dream, which was ridiculous because it wasn’t even the same class of bird. Even John knew that and he was hardly an expert. Not on this type of bird anyway. It was grey or brown and rather small. Perhaps a sparrow or a wren. Perhaps a great tit. John giggled out loud to himself. Great tit.

He watched it with detached fascination until Cyn’s cries shook him from his dazed state.

“John!” Cyn shrieked, “John! Did you see it? Get it out!”

She ran into the room and stopped dead at the door. Somewhere else in the house he could hear Jules wailing.

“Do something!” Cyn beseeched him frantically.

At her command John leaped to his feet in bed, his joints complaining as he did and jumping in place, wind-milled his arms like a mad man. The bird flapped frantically overhead. It was tangled in the drapes for a moment before it freed itself and soared back in direction of the bed.

John charged towards it once more, leaping off the bed like he would leap off a stage and it went sailing out the open window.

“That was simple enough,” John said with a grin, sitting down hard on the bed. He laughed weakly at the sight of Cyn, wrapped in a towel, her blonde hair dripping wet, her face flushed with the excitement of the morning.

“My dad always said it was a bad sign,” she said sheepishly, pushing her sopping hair out of her face.

John patted the bed beside him. “Yeah, it’s a sign the cats are good for fuck all.”

Cyn sat down on the edge of the bed regarding John warily. “He used to say it’s a portent of death. When a bird flies in and out your house.”

“It’s an old wives' saying, Cyn.” He leaned over and tapped her on the nose. But there was a part of him that couldn’t help but shiver at the thought. She shrugged and gave him a shy smile. He could tell she was hoping he’d take her in his arms, give her a kiss. But his dreams had left him restless and longing and not for his wife.

“Well, that’s today fucked then. Might as well blow me mind out,” John said leaning out of the bed to fish his pill box out of his trouser pocket. 

“You just keep that stuff in your pocket? John! Julian might find it!” She chided him.

“He knows better than to stick any old thing in his mouth. Unlike other members of this family, eh?” He waggled his eyebrows at her suggestively.

Cynthia blushed steadily. “I don’t see why you have to do it here,” she said obstinately.

“You could do it with me,” John said hopefully.

She shook her head once. “You have George or Paul or whoever for that.”

“Suit yourself.” John popped the tab under his tongue. “And Paul never does it with me. Too prim and proper.”

Cyn pulled the towel more securely around her breasts. “Smart lad,” she said as she left the room.

When Cyn had gone he lay back down in bed and tried to recall every last image of his dream. He tried to conjure up the image of Paul in the street turning to face him, his mouth forming his name like a prayer.

John had been telling himself in recent days that he needed to break himself of the habit of Paul. Of the way everything seemed to revolve around the man. How he felt himself bending towards Paul like a flower towards the sun every time he was in the room. How he measured everyone else in his life to Paul's standard. And found them lacking. But every time he thought he was getting better this would happen. He’d lie down to sleep and like a siren Paul would drag him to his doom.

* * *

The call came just before lunch and he knew at once something bad had happened. He checked his watch. It was only a matter of minutes before it hit. He could already feel it happening, his stomach in knots, anticipating the glamour approaching like a cyclone on the horizon. He braced himself, ready for it to wash over him.

"It's George, John." George sounded too casual, it made John tingle all over with foreboding.

George was in Liverpool; he’d driven home for Christmas to surprise his parents. Paul was in Liverpool, with Tara Browne. Tara Browne that insufferable posh wanker. That pretend patron to the arts with his foppish clothes and fancy cars. Paul loved him. Loved that whole avant garde scene. Pretty soon he’d have no use for the Beatles anymore. He'd have no use for John. 

"What's happened?" He couldn’t keep the panic out of his voice, that fine edge of hysteria.

"It's nothing to worry about. I’m just calling to let you know. Before you have it from the papers," George said quickly.

“Find out about what Georgie?” He lit a cigarette, watched the flame dancing a slow tango. He looked down at his bare feet and saw the floor was crawling. He had to hold on to the wall to keep from falling. He laughed out loud.

“Are you alright, John?” George asked.

His scalp began to prickle with needles and pins. It spread through him a fever, a fire. Far too fast. Each molecule of his body exploding. A bird’s eye view from an airplane at dusk as the lights in the city below came on. One after the other. Setting each other off like dominoes.

“I’m fine. Tell me what’s happened.”

His thoughts were chaotic; swarming in his mind like bees crawling over each other in a hive.  
He knew it deep in the pit of his stomach. A warm, dull feeling like a dropped melon splitting as it hit the ground, spilling its sweet pulpy guts. And the bees among the guts and seeds, their tiny fuzzy bodies sticky with melon juice.

“It’s Paul,” John said slowly, his tongue thick with honey.

“John? Are you listening? Paul’s been in an accident, near the Wirral. The roads were icy. He and Tara were on mopeds. He skidded and took a tumble, Paul, did.”

He couldn’t keep himself from falling. He was diving head first into it. Coming up so fast he couldn’t seem to hook his fingers into the fabric of the universe. Anger bloomed in him, blood red roses on snow. He pictured Paul’s face. That charming smile in black and white newsprint. He imagined putting his fist through it. Shattering its perfection. The mist of red spraying his own face. 

_(How could you leave me alone?_  
_How?_  
_I’ll never do you no harm._  
_I’ll never do you no harm._  
_I’ll never do you no harm._  
  
_**Stop!)** _

“It’s too soon,” John said, more to himself than George.

“Too soon for what? It happened last night. I heard about it this morning but I thought there was no point waking you, was there?”

_(You stupid cunt, how could you do this to me?)_

He was falling from a great height with Paul locked in his embrace. Together they hit the ground and shattered in a million pieces. Glass. No, ice. Shards of ice. Scattered across the road to the Wirral.

"You're not to worry about it." George insisted firmly, like he was speaking to a small child.

John could hear the blood pumping through his heart, louder than the tinny voice against his ear. As if he could stop himself from worrying. As if he had control anymore. He was in the car but there was no driver.

“You're not to go mental, yeah? John. We haven't told Eppy yet. We want to ease him into it. I’ll call him next."

_(Who is we?_  
_Who is we, George?_  
_Who have you been plotting with?_  
_Excluding me.)_  


“Are you going to be alright?" 

_(No.)_

This was the call a war widow received. This was that soft spoken speech about the honour of dying for your country.

“I know. I know that you and him...You and Paul..." 

_(There’s nothing to know._  
_Nothing to know about me and Paul._  
_Paul and I.)_  


“Me and Paul,” John repeated vaguely.

_(I know. I know that you and him…_  
_What do they know?_  
_What was there to know?)_

"John. Are you drunk? Are you...?" George’s concern was palpable though his tone remained sober, composed.

_(High. Stoned. Tripping._  
_Going to Strawberry Field,_  
_Nothing is real,_  
_And nothing to get hung about.)_  


Not quite. Not all the way. He still felt it on his horizon like the oncoming storm, looming large. It was only mist now. The air dense with anticipation and precipitation. 

"Let me talk with Cyn. Give the telephone to Cyn...Lennon..."

The telephone slid from his grasp and hit the floor sending up a flurry of sparks that struck his hand. John looked down at the pinpricks of light that made up his skin. And then up into Cyn’s swirling eyes as she searched for an explanation on his face.  


“Paul…” He began. He couldn’t say the rest out loud. Wouldn’t. 

A forest fire spread through him. It started with one burning stump and advanced, uncontrollable until it all went up, so fast there was no stopping it. The night sky orange and black: flame and ash. Like California during fire season. His insides burned away. It felt icy, sharp as peppermint.

He could see everything clearly, outlined in orange, back-lit in flames.

“I need to lie down,” he said, his voice coming through as if through several layers of cotton. He was elsewhere already.

_(With Paul.)_

"What's wrong? What's happened?" Cyn reached for him. Her hand stung, sinking through his arm, like a hot knife through butter. He was made of clouds. Made of smoke. John was made of ash. Fine black dust that hung on the windless air like a chain around a convict’s neck.

_(Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.)_  


“John! What’s happened? What did he say?” Cynthia honked, goose-like. Her neck elongated while he looked on, feathers sprouting, starting at the hairline and slicking down her back. Her beady eyes fixed on his.

A laugh escaped him at the sight of her. He tried to answer but only smoke issued from his mouth. Smoke and embers. Filling the room steadily.

He lay down on the floor, ignoring Cynthia’s desperate protestation. She stood by his feet, her hands imploring, her lips moving silently.

Why can't it be like this all the time? He thought cruelly as the smoke swallowed her up. He was falling again. The floor, only wood after all couldn’t support his body, heavy with flames.

The flame seared the sand and John was trapped behind a wall of glass like Snow White in her coffin. John was behind the glass pane. 

_(Glass pain?)_  


He could see figures of smoke struggling to reach him. They beat their hands on the window of his mind but he couldn't let them in. He was trapped inside. Or else he was locked outside, unable to reach those nebulous figures. 

He pressed himself up against the glass, palms flat. Ran his hand along the whole length of the surface, searching for an exit.

Once again he was searching for someone. Angling his head against the barriers to catch a glimpse of someone, just like in his dream. He wasn’t there, the man he was looking for. John couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or a bad one.

But she was there; she was on the other side. She stood beside a great number of faceless figures he assumed were the dead. He could see the sum of her parts, her hair the texture of candy floss, her eyes, the shape of her face; which he had no word for. All the parts of her that were soft and hard and familiar. 

_(But I say it just to reach you,_

_Julia.)_

That’s what John could see from his spot behind the glass. He knew as if by instinct Uncle George was there with her and Stuart. Stuart was speaking, a steady stream of words that John couldn’t seem to make out, though he tried to read his lips. He'd never stopped missing Stu, and the cadence of his words, the structure of his sentences; John missed his silences and plosives. 

**_(John._**  
_**Please.**_  
_**Wait.**_  
_**Don’t.**_  
_Let me down.)_  


That was all he could read on Stu’s lips. He strained his ears again, desperate to hear the voices of the dead but all he could hear was the sound of people shouting and cars in the streets, the screech of tires. The scent of the nearby park, of earth and asphalt, flint and gunpowder. He heard three cracks, four, maybe five. The brief explosion, a car backfiring or perhaps fireworks disturbed the winter air, distant siren of an ambulance or police car.

The glass was gone. He could feel someone’s hands on him, manhandling him professionally as a doctor might, or an undertaker. He was a slab of meat not a human being. There was something comforting about it. He was heavy, drowsy, he sank into a tub of hot water, all the way down, underwater there was no sound, no way to speak without choking. It felt good. 

“Are you John Lennon?”

He jerked alert, gulped cold air. His lungs burned with oxygen. He tried to answer but the words wouldn’t come.  
He was in a car moving fast through an unfamiliar street. The crackle and hiss of the radio in the background. All at once the world came alive. And he could hear singing.

_(All my loving. All my loving. All my loving.)_  


He shut his eyes because he couldn’t keep them open any longer. He managed to nod once, his head rolled to one side. It was pitch black with his eyes shut.

“Try not to move.”

The blackness was liquid; no, viscous, sticky, like tar. It was sweet and vaguely sulphuric treacle. He recognised it: the sweetness that was death.

_(I’ll never let you down.)_  


“Mr. Lennon?”

John twitched awake at the sound of his name. He hadn’t realised he had been asleep.

_(Had he?_  
_Been asleep?_  
_Only sleeping?)_  


It was difficult to tell for how long he’d been gone.

“We’ve just reached the halfway point.”

Not a voice he recognised. It was a southern voice, not old or young. Not too high or too low. The type of voice he wouldn’t think twice about.

He was in the back seat of a car, his car. He stretched his legs, relaxing each muscle slowly while he tried to figure out if he was injured in anyway, a habit born of nights of blackout drinking.

Satisfied he was physically unharmed, he thought perhaps he’d been asleep so long that the drug had worn off, but then he looked out the window.  
The landscape was like a film that had come loose in a projector, whipping in the air as the reel went round and round. Or perhaps he was the film, his body a banner caught in the wind, the sail of a ship.

_(Halfway to where?)_  


He didn't recognise the countryside outside his car. It was a blur. A scribble. Pencil on cheap hotel stationary, everything in his own comic hand. In the corner of his mind: Red. Blue. Gold. Stu's frenetic brushstrokes. The filigree patterning of paint on paint. Here, a tree was recognisable. There, a house. A road. A babbling brook. A stream of consciousness.

John was still trapped inside the belly of the beast. He was high. Or he was dead. It occurred to him this must be a vehicle of death and its driver, the reaper.

“Are you real?” John asked. His mouth was so dry his voice came out hoarse and rusty. His lips were chapped; he ran his tongue over them and cleared his throat.

As he looked down at the leather of the seats he saw it crack and flake away. He saw the paint peel off the metal ribcage of the car. Rust appeared like dark pools of blood. The driver turned his white, waxy face towards John; he spied the skeletal hands on the wheel. The man opened his mouth to laugh, it sounded like the rattle of a tambourine. John blinked and the driver was flesh again.

The man laughed out loud. Try though he might, John could find nothing sinister in that deep, warm laugh. From the belly.

“Oh yes," the driver said, "I'm real. The question is are you?"

"Debateable," John said with a laugh. He pinched himself to test it. "Ouch. Real enough. You know who I am but I'm not sure who you are."

“My name is Si, Mr. Lennon.”

“Sssssigh,” John repeated. The letter s was a snake. He couldn’t say it without hissing its white hot static sound. It went on for miles and miles. Sigh. “What sort of name is Sigh?”

“It’s short for Simon, sir.”

“Ah yes. Simple Simon. There’s a joke here. Something involving Simon says. But it escapes me now. So tell me this Sigh, where are you taking me?”


	2. The Peak

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Don’t you know then?” Si asked. “Don’t you know where we’re going?”
> 
> John's road trip late December 1965 continues.
> 
> Still not a death fic.

It was warm in the car, it pulsed with heat; a living thing. John undid his collar, his shirt was damp with sweat.

“Don’t you know then?” Si asked. “Don’t you know where we’re going?”

The driver whose name was Sigh, short for Simon, glanced in the mirror. A ripple of surprise passed over his face but he managed to keep his thoughts to himself. He was a professional it seemed.

  


__

_( **John? Are you listening?  
Are you listening?** )_

  


“No, I don’t. You know what? Don’t tell me where we’re going. I’d rather not know,” John said quickly in the few seconds Si hesitated. There was something at the back of his mind, like the tickling of a sore throat. It struggled to get to free but John swallowed it down.

  


__

_( **You're not to worry.** )_

  


“As you wish, sir.” His tone was carefully neutral. 

  


_( **I know. I know that you and him…**_

_No._

_He wasn’t ready for that yet.)_

  


He could feel the car breathing, its ribcage expanding and contracting. The hum of the motor was like the low snarl of a beast. On his padded leather seat, John felt it shivering through him like a bassline. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine a guitar lick to go with that bassline thrumming in his core. He tried to imagine lyrics. But none would come. He thought he’d hum a bit to Paul when he saw him next. Maybe he’d jumpstart John’s lagging muse, give him a few lines, maybe the chorus. He could almost hear the suggestions now.

Suddenly, like a jolt of electric current shocking his system, he needed to see Paul’s face. The need was so acute, piercing him with its urgency. He was full of that static that was Paul. White noise.

“Where are we going Sigh?” John asked again. He wanted to tell him to take him to Paul. But in that instant he couldn’t for the life of him remember where Paul was. His mind shut down every time he edged near the memory.

The steel trap slammed shut. “No. Don’t tell me.”

Si nodded once in response.

Outside they glided down tree lined boulevards. He spied the cosy cafes serving vin ordinaire and moules frites. The men sitting outside smoking their Gitanes. He thought he spied two slender boys in their drainies and leather sitting under the trees. They sat so close they were almost on top of each other, laughing, their heads touching. 

  


__

_(They look like lovers. It's me and Paul._

_People will say we're in love.)_

  


Paris became Hamburg. The dreary squalor of it, the grime. The casual promiscuity. John was starving. Bone weary but restless. His stomach was rumbling. Paul’s head was in his lap, his chest rising and falling as he slept. George’s head on his socked foot. Stu sat in Astrid’s lap, oblivious to the world around him. And beyond them stood Ritchie Starkey, already Ringo but not yet a Beatle, watching them all. The light glinting off his rings as he lit his cigarette.

John squinted at the lights. Garish. Blinking. Top Ten. Star. Indra. The rattle of beads on a striptease costume. The “girls” with their flaking makeup, the provocative sway of their hips. Their dicks soft in their knickers, like pale white creatures swathed in lace and silk. Their teasing and leering like the cooing of doves.

  


_( **Komm mal her. Du bist so schön, Junge. Soll ich dir einen runterholen?  
Gratis, wenn du mir was vorsingst.**_

_...he's my baby._

_...don’t mean maybe._

_...he’s my baby love.)_

  


“Taking me backwards and forwards in time, Sigh?” John asked.

“I thought you didn’t want to know where we’re going, Mr. Lennon?”

The glaring lights from the night clubs blinded him. He reached in his pocket for his sunglasses but found he’d left them at home. Instead he pulled out his spectacles, slid them on. He wasn’t sure how he could ever have mistaken the Keys for Hamburg.

“I don’t,” John said. He didn’t sound convincing.

Outside he could see winds whipping the palms. The sky: a bruise of purple, yellow and rose. The ocean, a beast that would not be tamed, would not be placated. It was not water but paper. Each wave a Thai shadow puppet manipulated by a dancing figures in gold and blue. They beat their banners against the metal shell of the car but the driver seemed unperturbed.

"Key West,” John said out loud. “The night we cried.”

He recalled the salty taste of Paul’s tears. He’d tasted them covertly as they wept, arms around each other. Part of Paul was inside him still. He could feel him there pushing against him. Hard, pulsing, warm as a stiff prick. Filling him beyond his capacity as if he were an eager cunt, rather than a man.

He rolled down the window to feel the sea air. To smell the hurricane. Salt. Metal. The smell of Paul’s hair, damp with sweat. His stomach dropped. He’d felt weightless with apprehension and excitement. What if they’d died? had been his thought. If the hurricane pulled the house out from under them? What if they died and John never said what he’d always meant to say one day?

  


_(What about the night they died?)_

  


“Sir?” Sigh asked. He didn’t turn his head. His eyes were fixed on the road. Like a good little pet. A well trained dog. John didn’t answer so he didn’t press the matter.

“Nothing. It’s started to rain,” John said, his forehead leaned against the window.

  


_( **I know. I know that you and him…**_

_I know what’s coming down._

_And I know where it’s coming from.)_

  


When it hit, John thought a bullet had broken the windshield. He half rose in his seat, his hands gliding over his body, searching for wounds. He was unharmed. The broken body of a bird was caught in the windshield wipers, its tiny wings bent at an unnatural angle. He could see its pinprick eyes, minute beak. Pink streaked the glass, a daubing of blood. One morbid step in a ritual sacrifice. John felt his stomach heave. He was trapped inside John Lennon. Trapped inside that monster. He was writhing against his skin, against his bones, he needed out. Needed out now.

“Stop,” John said, a mounting panic grabbing hold of him with its clammy hands. “Stop the car! Fuck, just stop the car, okay?”

  


__

_(They say it’s a portent of death.)_

  


He stood up, his head grazing the dripping palate of the beast. He could see a flash of Si’s nondescript face in the mirror. He squinted and saw a flash of bone white, the sharp-angled, cheekless, bare-toothed grin of a skull. John screamed when his hand touched the door handle. The handle was a serpent; cold, dry, and slithering under John’s palm. He jerked his hand away, crying out in alarm, ready to jump when the car stopped.

The car spat him out into the damp road, palms and knees connecting with the concrete with an audible crack. Like an egg breaking. There was nothing in his stomach to expel but John retched and coughed all the same, spat bile and shuddered. The drug was in his system. Insidious, quicksilver. There was no breaking free from this trip. He had to wait for it to pass.

Behind him Si was cleaning the windshield with a bit of newspaper. “All gone now, all clean. It happens sometimes, you know. They fly low.”

John didn't turn to look he felt Si's hand feather light on his shoulder. He handed him a handkerchief and a canteen of water and John took them gratefully.

“It’s gone now, poor thing. It was quick at least.”

  


_(Poor thing. It was quick at least._

_Was it? Was it quick?_

_When you lay in the road. Poor wingless bird._

_Poor Julia.)_

  


He took a sip of water, felt it slide down his throat, causing things to bloom inside him. Green. Succulent. Insistent. That's the way it worked, something died and something was born. It was harder to stamp life out than it looked. He wiped his mouth on the handkerchief.

“Where are we going, Sigh?” He asked yet again.

There were green tendrils tangled in his jejunum. Wrapped around his liver, squeezing his kidneys. The feather shaped leaves tickled the soft tissue of his insides. Blossoms unfurled one by one, climbed up his throat and out his ears. He had to pull out handfuls of foliage in order to hear Si's answer.

“You didn’t want to know, sir," Si reminded him.

“Just tell me. I want to know now, okay? Why are you here? Who called you?” The questions shot from his mouth rapid fire. Like a rain of bullets.

“Mr. Epstein arranged for me to take you to Liverpool, sir. To Allerton.”

  


_(Allerton._

__

_So he wasn’t dead after all._

_Paul was.)_

  


His mind halted its thrashing. He went impossibly silent. Impossibly cold. All the plants pushing their way up out of him withered at once. Dry stalks that clung to his veins and sucked the life's blood from him. He had known this would happen. He'd felt it in that self-same blood. Tangled in his intestine, where those plants now shrivelled. He swallowed his words; they tasted green like plant sap.

"Come again sir?"

"No." John shivered, leaned against the side of the car and slid to the ground. He felt it behind warm, pulsing, alive. "No. Not like him. Not again. He was special."

The driver watched him in the mirror. His eyes were sharp, grey as gun metal.

"Special to you," Si clarified.

"Special to anyone. Special to the world. To me."

He thought of Paul cold, unable to hear, trapped inside skin and muscle and bone. The blood cold, solid in his veins. Raging against it, against that unmoving stone of his corpse. To no avail. There was no way Paul was silent. No way he was still. Unlike John who craved that deathlike peace of sleep; Paul was unstoppable as the tide. Even in sleep he seemed to be in constant motion.

“You and him…” Si began. He sounded like George now, his voice small and flat on the other end of the telephone.

  


__

_(There was no him and me._

__

_Not like that._

_Not ever._

_There never would be now.)_

  


"My partner," John explained as if there were anyone left in the world who didn't know that.

"You...were close?"

  


_(I’ll never make it alone._

_Don’t ever leave me alone.)_

  


"Too close for comfort. Not close enough," John answered. He drew his knees up to his chin. His chest hurt as if he'd been running too far too fast. Behind him the car groaned with laughter. The ground rippled with hysteria. John hugged himself close, afraid the vibrations would split him apart. 

  


__

_(He'd laughed for Uncle George._

__

_Laughed for Julia._

__

_He'd laughed for Stu._

__

_The world laughed for Paul.)_

__

__

__

__  


And then with a clap of thunder like a slapped cheek, the sky opened and rain hammered down. The world was crying for Paul because John couldn't. The raindrops were razor sharp. They slashed his skin where they hit.

“I knew it would happen,” he admitted at last, his voice cracking. “I should have pushed him away.”

Si asked what he meant but there was no way to explain. Water trickled into John’s collar; he blinked away the rain that blinded him.

“Come along Mr. Lennon," Si said gently. When he leaned close John could smell him, sweet and powdery like rotting flowers. "You'll be soaked through."

Si took his arm and helped him back into the backseat of the car. John’s arm scrapped the teeth of the beast on his way into its cavernous mouth. His head connecting with its damp drooling palate. He ran his hands over the spongy nodules of the tongue. It stank of meat and decay.

Resigned, he leaned back. For the remainder of the drive he was one with the beast. They shared sinews, veins, blood. They shared organs. Breathed as one.

When they arrived John was reluctant to resume his independence. He was reluctant to become John again. To detach himself from the beast. To think and breathe and move on his own. To make decisions.

“Mr. Lennon. John, sir,” Si said softly breaking the silence. “You should go in. We’ve come all this way.” 

John started to cough and choked instead. He ran his tongue along the inside of his cheek. Flared his nostrils and clenched his fists. Inside his shoes he flexed his toes. Reflected in the mirror he could see his pinprick pupils behind the thick lenses. He took off his glasses and slipped them into his pocket.

He tried to think of what it might be like to face Paul’s family. All at once he thought he could smell Mendips directly after Julia died. It was strange, because if you had asked him to describe it out of turn he wouldn’t have been able to. But he recognised the smell now. Perfume and smoke and too many bodies. The sick-making smell of leftover food. The stale smell of a beery hangover. He remembered how he’d kept his eyes glued on the door. Had kept expecting her to breeze through it. John remembered all the kind words people had whispered in his ear but he couldn’t recall Paul’s words. He probably hadn’t said much of anything. He had simply been there. So much of what had mattered in John’s life to date had mattered because Paul had been there. And now he never would be there again.

“What do I say? What can I say to them? Sorry for your loss? Sorry for…Paul was…my friend…” His voice cracked. He opened the car door to mask his confusion. Stuck his head back in the car to catch Si’s answer.

“You tell them the truth. You tell them what’s on your mind, sir,” Si said.

  


_(I love you more than yesterday.)_

__

  


The truth was he’d waited until it was too late. The truth was he had killed him. Like he’d killed the others.

The truth was he was poison. And he had always known it. He’d known it and he hadn’t pushed Paul away. Quite to the contrary. He’d pulled him closer. Clung to him. Desperate. Needy. A choking vine squeezing all that was vital from him.

He’d used him up. 

  


_(And now what?_

__

_What would he be without Paul?_

_I’ll never make it alone.)_

  


He walked to the door only looking back once. Si rested like an eyeball in the socket of the beast’s skull. He had taken John’s place. Melded with the creature. Perhaps he had never been a man, always an appendage.

Free of his chariot prison there was nowhere for John to go but straight to the door to ring the bell.

“Mr. McCartney,” he said by way of greeting when Paul’s father opened the door at last.

Jim McCartney looked right through him, searching for someone who wasn’t there. He stretched out a hand to touch the old man to claim his attention, and Jim recoiled as though it was a snake.

“Mr. McCartney. I heard…I heard about Paul.”

At the sound of his son’s name he managed to focus on John’s face.

“The Lennon boy, isn’t it? Come all the way from London, have you?”

John inclined his head. “I came as soon as I heard.”

They stood there for an eternity in awkward silence. So long John could hear the grass growing. The earth turn round the sun.

“Well, you had better come in before they alert the press.”

John stepped in after Jim, shutting the door behind him. The sound was final. He’d sealed himself into a tomb.

Jim looked nothing like his son. He was too rough, too angular. But there was something about the way his brows arched, the way he twisted his lips in displeasure that made John think of Paul. In the dim light of the hall, Jim's face was nearly blue. He was old, and not as big as he had been in John’s memory. He still wore the same clothes: a threadbare stripped shirt and trousers shiny with age. When he moved forward, John could see the elastic poking out of the blue knit of his socks like earthworms in loam. Nothing to be afraid of, just a sad old man. John had never had much respect for old men. He’d grown up with strong women. One look from Mimi could still stop him dead in his tracks. He used to tell Paul to stand up to Jim even three years ago, four years ago.

You want me to tell him? He used to ask Paul with that sharp edge of cruelty in his voice, needle sharp, razor sharp. You want me to tell him you’re with me?  
Paul would always shake his head. He’s my father.  
So you tell him then. Tell him you choose music. You choose the Beatles. Tell him you choose me.  
In the end he did.

  


__

_(In the end he made him choose._

_Paul chose him.)_

  


John had always imagined that when he finally did it, finally stood up to his father, it would be more formal, like the proclamation at a wedding ceremony. But it had been anticlimactic. In the end Paul had been an adult about it. John still dreamed of throwing it in Jim McCartney’s face, the way he had with Mimi. They were the Beatles. They had money, they were famous, desired, worshipped. Millions screamed, pissed themselves at the first chord.

Paul had chosen right. Paul had chosen John. Now he would never get to do that. Never get to rub it in while Jim squirmed, discomfited. Jim had been right all along. John lay in the palm of Paul’s hand, immobile and silenced. In the centre of Paul’s bloodstained palm, John was the gash that had severed his life line.

Jim McCartney was watching him with that calm, inquisitive expression he’d often seen on Paul’s face. He seemed tired, frail but as far as John could tell there were no signs of grief on the man. No furrows in the marble of his face- where tears had streamed, hot and caustic. He felt his stomach dip in repulsion. How could he look so composed?

  


__

_(Paul was dead.)_

  


John squared his shoulders.

  


__

_(Once more unto the breach...)_

__

  


"If...um...there's anything I can do. Anything at all. Paul...I should have..." It came reedy, too fast, a recording played on the wrong speed.

"You should have let well enough alone," Jim said angrily. His eyes were black as onyx. Highly polished. John saw himself reflected in them. Pale, flabby, his own eyes blank, mouth slack.

He could see Jim's pulse writhing in his forehead like snakes, struggling beneath his crumpled paper skin. John couldn't speak. His famous tongue usually so sharp, so scathing, was like lead.

"I warned him,"Jim went on, “I told him you were bad news. But he thought the world of you. You. Presumptuous middle class stock. Son of a whore and a sailor."

John opened his mouth again, forced the words up from his gut. He could feel them stick in his throat all sharp points and prickle; when at last they surfaced, only feathers issued from his lips.

"You think I never noticed. You sly fox at the hen coop. The way you wrapped my boy round your little finger. In them days you had him following you, hanging on your every word. Unnatural. That’s what it was." 

John regurgitated the feathers on to the flowery carpet. A puddle of saliva and hundreds of feathers among the roses and the lilies.

"I admired him, that’s all. I admired his talent," he said when he could speak again, plucking the last of the feathers from between his teeth.

The veins twisted beneath Jim's neck, twin vipers. John couldn’t look away as they strained against his baggy skin.

"You wanted him,” Jim McCartney went on, “you think that was easy for a father to see? On the television set, in the papers, for everyone to see. Not just his body..."

John felt his stomach turn, vomit rising to his throat. He gagged, swallowing the sick down. Sour, burning him from the inside. Sweat prickled between his shoulder blades. And with a start he realised that he was half aroused listening Jim's words.

"...but his soul. You wanted him entire."

What could he say to that? It was true. John felt his cock twitch against the fabric of his trousers. He looked up into Jim’s face trying to see if he’d noticed but Paul’s father’s eyes were glassy with hate. A stiff cock wasn’t going to make any difference. His disgust already knew no bounds.

He scuffed his shoe along the worn carpet. Paul had purchased a number of things for the house over the years. He'd been proud he was able to provide luxuries for his family. But this carpet remained. John wondered if it was because Mary McCartney had chosen it, with its pattern of roses and lilies. Red and white. They twined about his ankle, holding him in place. Thorns from the roses biting into his flesh. He struggled to lift his foot, the flesh tore with a sickening crunch, the blood pooled in his shoe.

"I did," He admitted, struggling against the vines still. “I wanted him. Loved…"

The word hung between them. Heavy as ashes in velvet, green and gold. It tasted of pepper, numbing his tongue.

The word echoed. Double tracked. Leaving trails of snail slime in the air; silver paths that spoke volumes.

  


__

  
_(The word was love.)_

  


"You don't understand the meaning of love. All one has to do is ask your wife. Your child. You weren't built to love."

__

John shivered. He looked down at his hands, his knobbly knees, the narrow feet, and the layer of fat beneath his skin. He was a creature of contradictions. Not built to love.

__

“I tried. I did my best. With what I had to work with."

__

“That doesn't make it better!" Jim shouted. His tongue was forked. He moved towards John, his skin shifting in a prism of colour. John could still see him when he closed his eyes, still see the outline of Jim McCartney; pulling back, fist balled, John braced himself for the impact and punched the old man straight in the mouth, his false teeth rattled to the ground one by one like a snapped string of pearls.

His knuckles were slick with blood, the white of the bone visible. He’d tucked his thumb under his fingers foolishly and now it was broken. He grasped Mr. McCartney’s collar to hold him in place and then hit him again and again. Each blow sent sparks through him, pleasure that had him shuddering and gasping. He was a blacksmith, hammering metal into submission, using violence to make art. It was a different way to create.

Paul's father was all but unrecognisable: red on red on grey. But John couldn't calm that rage, couldn’t stop the creature from clawing its way out of him beak and claw. Like a shapeshifter in a horror story, he abandoned his old form. It collapsed at his feet like a bundle of blood-slick skins. His new self was still damp and wobbly, blind as a new-born cat.

Jim backed away from him, eyes wide in terror. John drew back his arm, sharp talons extended as he brought them down hard across Jim’s grey face. He fell apart in two perfect, bloodless halves. Toppled to the ground by John’s feet like a sack of potatoes.

__

"Fuck a pig," John said as Jim’s body dissolved into the carpet.

"John?"

He'd know that voice anywhere.

  


_(If he were across the Styx he would still hear it over the screams of the dead.)_

__

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to continue John's psychedelic pilgrimage to Paul in this chapter, once again if it seems less than authentic keep in mind I was trying to stay true to the story I'm telling.
> 
> No birds or dads were harmed in the making of this chapter. 
> 
> [ Twinka's beautiful art of Si and the bird.](https://twinka.tumblr.com/post/160952186396/when-it-hit-john-thought-a-bullet-had-broken-the)
> 
> Once again I used snippets of song lyrics to underline John's mental state:
> 
> "People Will Say we're in Love" from Oklahoma, Rodgers and Hammerstein  
> "Be Bop A Lula" Gene Vincent (With altered pronouns.)  
> "Here Today" Paul McCartney (slightly altered)  
> "I know I know" John Lennon  
> "Oh! Darling" The Beatles  
> "The Word" The Beatles
> 
> The lines in German during the Hamburg hallucination are: Come here. You're so beautiful, boy. Shall I toss you off? No charge if you sing me something.
> 
> Thanks to all my lovely Beatle pals. You know who you are. Particularly Heybluejayway and Coffeeandclassicrock!
> 
> Thanks as always to Single-Pigeon. I love you girl.
> 
> Thank you my darling JaneScarlett. For endless encouragement and putting up with me for so long. And of course the beta. 
> 
> Twinka, my dear one! I love your art!!!!!!!! Your art is amazing. (Everyone gets to see it very soon) And you're amazing. And I love how you really inspire me to write originally. 
> 
> Dear readers in the next chapter we finally see you know who...
> 
> Keep in mind an acid trip lasts quite a long time- up to 12 hours.  
> So if it seems like John is taking forever to come down that's normal.


	3. The Come Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "In the blink of an eye he stood beside John doing that little dance they sometimes did when they were too shy to embrace. John’s feet moved of their own accord, followed Paul’s lead in a funny little foxtrot. Slow, slow, quick, quick."
> 
> At last John arrives at his destination.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear readers,  
> Just a little reminder that John is an unreliable narrator. (As he was in life.) In this story he's on drugs and while he believes everything he's seeing, his senses are impaired and so we, as the readers, can't always trust him that what he's seeing is truth. As he eventually manages to filter fact from fiction, we will be able to join him in understanding the full events of that day.  
> Thank you!

Paul stood on the steps, a gaunt figure, his hair mussed, face unshaven. His eyes were very dark and wide, eyes to fall into. An event horizon. John was trapped in them unable to move, unable to speak. No escape possible.

His mouth was bruised: purple and blue as an overripe plum. A crooked line of stitches marred his upper lip. A series of hieroglyphs that spelled out his name in some primal language: J-O-H-N.

Paul was so pale he was translucent. He glowed. A light from within so bright John couldn’t look directly at him. He was a spirit. An angel.

"Spectre," John breathed. He scrambled backwards, thrusting his bloody hands behind him; his mouth opened and closed in shock.

When Paul laughed the light escaped him in fits and sparks. “Hardly,” he said as he bounded down the steps towards John. “What are you doing here, then?” He sounded so normal, so cheerful.

The man was quick for a ghost, in the blink of an eye he stood beside John doing that little dance they sometimes did when they were too shy to embrace. John’s feet moved of their own accord, followed Paul’s lead in a funny little foxtrot. Slow, slow, quick, quick.

Paul’s shirt was very clean and freshly pressed. From where he stood, John could smell how clean it was, the laundry soap they’d used as children and starch. As well as another scent, a cocktail of smells: hot metal, diesel, and gunpowder. 

  


__

_(The roads were icy._

__

_He took a tumble. ___

____

_They say it’s a portent of death.)_

____

__  
__

"I'm sorry," he said. Behind his back he twisted his hands into knots as if that would keep him from hurting Paul or clasping him close.

"Sorry for what? It's okay. I'm okay. You look terrible, John. Is it that bad?" Paul's hands flew to his face, white birds startled by a sudden sound. He laughed nervously. "Guess I'm not the cute Beatle anymore."

"Don't…" John said, anguish colouring his voice.

  


__

_(How could he laugh? How could he joke?_

_Don't ever leave me alone.)_

__

  


The shivering feeling of the world turning inside out like walking through the looking glass.  
He could remember his fist cracking the perfect porcelain of Paul's face, the paint peeling away. 

  


_(Had that happened?_

_Had that part been real?)_

  


The shell of Paul’s body was falling apart, the light shining through the cracks, brighter than a supernova. Paul was still beautiful. Perhaps more beautiful now than he had ever been while alive. His was a beauty like a star exploding.

  


_(Only you outshine the rest.)_

__

  


But what John was looking at now was a shadow. The stars in the sky were already dead. The light they cast was a memory of what had been. This was but an echo of Paul McCartney. Little more than a recording.

“Oh, John,” Paul said gently. “Don’t look at me like that. It barely hurts, I swear.”

John leaned forward involuntarily and grabbed Paul’s arm; stopped the escaping starlight with the palm of his hand. It shone through his fingers, the sky on a summer's day, blinding him. He felt Paul's light drawing him in, and for a beautiful, fleeting moment, he longed to be there, beneath Paul's skin, running through his veins like blood. Paul looked down at his hand and gave him a small smile.

“Thanks for coming all the way here. God John, for coming all the way here for me. I feel so foolish...”

He sounded as if he were speaking of some trivial annoyance rather than his death. A traffic jam. A mosquito bite. John couldn’t seem to get past the initial shock, Paul was here. It didn’t matter what form he appeared to him in. He was here and all John could do was stare. He no longer looked like a thing of starlight. He looked like a man. A beautiful, bruised man.

Paul pulled on John’s sleeve to get his attention just like Jules might.  


“Come on. What are we standing here for?”

All at once Paul was fifteen again. Red in the face with excitement, anxious for them to be alone so that he could play him the new song he’d learned. He took John’s hand and the world imploded.

Going up the steps John felt himself growing taller until the house felt tight on him like a jacket he'd outgrown, or perhaps everything else was shrinking. Paul's room was miniature. He didn't know how they had ever fit in that narrow bed together. His stomach flipped, thinking of them lying side by side. Of what it was like to wake up with Paul curved against him, warm and sleep-tousled, singing softly as he dreamed. His cock half stiff in sleep, pressed to John's backside. John had been filled with longing. Longing he’d had no word for at the time. Longing like a blaze of incoherent fire in his brain. Arousal, more poignant than a lullaby would rock him to sleep. But no, no, uncharacteristically John had managed to control himself. He’d been too afraid that Paul would laugh at him. How silly that fear seemed to him now back in Paul’s old room. He knew the word for that longing now. Really, he'd always known it. He knew a few words: queer, gay, poofter, fairy, faggot.

  


__

_(Something inside that was always denied._

__

_For so many years.)_

  


By the window was an open suitcase filled with a jumble of clothes and shoes. Two guitar cases leaned against the wall. Paul’s bass lay among his shirts and trousers like a baby in a manger.

On the chair beside it was Paul's good coat. It stank of damp wool and blood. Yesterday's shoes lay discarded at the foot of the bed. Thin summer shoes with smooth soles, the laces double tied. Paul kicked them under the bed and sat down with his feet tucked beneath him.

John picked up a gore-crusted scarf. It was one that had once belonged to John himself; he’d lent it to Paul one chilly evening when he’d said he was coming down with a sore throat. John hadn’t even missed it till now. He clutched the scarf to his chest now, stroked the streaks of Paul’s blood. He sat down beside Paul awkwardly. The bed was tiny, a doll’s bed and John had to sit on the very edge of it, his knees pressed together, to avoid touching Paul.

“Did you have a happy Christmas?” Paul asked shyly.

"Where is Tara?" John asked, finding his voice at last, ignoring Paul’s question. He was startled, how breezy he sounded. How casual, as if there weren’t an undercurrent brewing beneath his calm exterior. As if there wasn’t ice at his core.

"Just gone out. Should be back in a bit." Paul was gazing at him. His hand strayed towards John’s knee and for a moment he almost allowed himself to relax. Allowed himself to forget the circumstances that had brought them to this point: Paul had come to Liverpool with Tara. He had told John to stay in Weybridge. He’d left him alone.

The killing frost travelled through him rapidly, withering all that was good and gentle. His insides were clogged with ice. Paul was sitting too close, his lips were already blue, his breath hung on the air.

"Shouldn't he be here with you, then? What the fuck was so important?" John spat, silver in his voice, the silver of hoarfrost.

Paul drew back in shock at the sudden change in the weather, wrapped his arms around himself.

"He went to get pain medicine. He went to fetch me something for the pain,” he answered slowly, buying time.

“He left you alone!” John struggled to modulate his tone but failed. The words came out shrivelled and frostbitten.

“I'm a grown man, John. I didn't need him here to hold my hand." Paul’s eyebrows arched upwards. His mouth twisted crossly. How quickly he mirrored John, taking on that same frigid tone.

"Oh no? What did you need him to hold?"

Paul turned away in disgust. "You're pathetic, you know that?"

John was too angry to care. All he could think was that Paul had abandoned him for Tara and had nearly gotten himself killed in the process. He tossed the scarf to the floor.

  


_(How could you do this to me, you cunt?)_

__

  


"Look at me!" John demanded.

Paul looked straight at him. His eyes were bloodshot. All the light had gone out of them. He looked so young, so broken that John wished he could take it all back. Melt the frost with a kind word and a gentle touch.

"I'm too tired for this crap, John,” he said wearily.

John's stomach churned, he held his breath till the feeling passed. That feeling that he was a nuisance. People tired of him easily because he used them up. Because he sucked the life from them. It occurred to him that Tara might be a much simpler man. It occurred to him that Tara might be what Paul wanted. He let his fingers stray towards Paul's, his thumb passing over his little finger. Paul looked up at him, he almost smiled, a small quirk of his battered mouth. He crossed his ring finger over John's thumb and John felt Paul surge through him. He could taste him, feel him overwhelming his senses.

"It's alright. You chose him. I understand." John's laughter was thin, strained. He swallowed it down like bitter medicine.

"No, you silly boy. You don't understand anything,” Paul mouthed exaggeratedly, rolled his eyes.

John bristled. "What then?" He whipped his hand away, stung.

Paul sighed in exasperation. He pulled out a cigarette and stuck it between his lips wincing. Took it out again and tested the stitches with his fingertips. John could see the light shining through the stitches.

"You can be so incredibly thick for the clever Beatle, you know?" He said at last.

John flushed with anger and shame. "Speak plainly, Paul. I haven't slept properly since..."

  


__

_(Since you left for Liverpool with Tara.)_

__

  


"It was you! It was you I wanted here with me, you know? Fuck!" Paul said, his voice pitched high in frustration.

John plucked the forgotten cigarette from between Paul’s trembling fingers and smoked it slowly while he composed himself. For a merciful minute they stared at each other, unable to look away.

“Did you really…” John began.

“Yes!” Paul grabbed the stub of a cigarette from him, put it between his lips, “You idiot-”

Tara was standing by the door, his face red with cold or embarrassment, his bright hair mussed. "They gave me the good pills,” he said. "Oh...I...beg your pardon," he looked from John to Paul and back again.

John let out a bark of laughter. Of course they never could catch a break. It was always something; always someone interrupting them.

"It's alright. Ta, Tara." Paul's cheeks were scarlet, his eyes glassy. He looked from Tara to John, wove his fingers together childishly. A maiden caught between two suitors.

Tara cleared his throat and looked down at his shoes. Expensive, glossy leather. His trousers were good wool, tailored. More stylish than Eppy. Lately Paul had been emulating Tara's style. John pictured the two of them shopping together, sharing clothes. The way they did in Hamburg out of necessity and covert sentimentality. His own shoes were scuffed to all fuck. Jules had drawn something on the toe in chalk. One of his socks was blue and the other black. His trousers were a little too tight, they hugged his thighs unattractively. Next to Tara's golden beauty John was a beast. He’d left it too long and this bright eyed boy had swooped in and claimed his prize.

"Paul's been a pet showing me everything. It was such an honour to be invited in the first place," Tara gushed. He was so easy to like. His voice lyrical, his accent refined.

John managed to remain silent. He tugged on his earlobe and smiled congenially as he might during a press conference.

"Calm down," Paul said abruptly, his eyes fixed on John's face. His every muscle was tensed as if he was prepared to jump if necessary. To grab a blanket and smother the flames of John's anger.

"I am calm," he said, his voice sounded calm enough, his features were composed. He still sat loose-limbed upon Paul’s bed. But the rage flared suddenly, a flash fire. He felt the searing madness, overwhelming, scorching his brain with its urgency.

"Apparently," Paul said dryly.

Tara loitered by the doorway clutching the paper prescription bag from the pharmacy. His eyes jumped from Paul to John and back again. He was trying to read them, John realised. Trying to read between the lines like a damned fan searching for hidden meaning in their lyrics. He couldn’t blame him. John himself had often longed for a lexicon to decipher the code of John and Paul.

"I've interrupted something, shall I come back later?" he asked with a nervy little smile that made John want to punch him.

John wanted to grab Tara by the collar and throw him to the ground. Wanted to beat him with his clenched fists. Kick him with his scuffed shoes. He didn't belong here in Paul's little room. With its narrow single bed and bright vinyl flooring. He didn't belong in the room where John had first realised that he wanted to kiss Paul McCartney.

"No, it's quite alright Tara. Thank you for fetching the pills. Come in. There isn’t much room I’m afraid," Paul beckoned Tara in with a wave of his hand but he didn't stand up. He pressed his knee to John's. The action was careless but John knew it was deliberate. The way Paul always managed to find him when he was crippled with stage fright. His fingers caressing John somewhere covertly. His elbow, his hip, the nape of his neck as he helped arrange his hair, his chest as he straightened his tie.

  


__

_(Don't be nervous, John.)_

__

  


He felt the tell-tale heat in his cheeks as he swallowed down the rage. 

  


__

_( **It was you! Fuck!** )_

__

  


There was the way Paul said Tara's name. He tried to listen beyond those two syllables, to find some proof of what had passed between them in the inflection of Paul's voice. Did he say 'John' like that? Did Paul speak his name with that kind of casual affection?

Then there was the look on Paul's face, wonder, and admiration. And it was all for Tara Browne, that smug, posh prick.

John felt a stab of fear in his gut. A cold, crawling panic washed over him. Once, when they had first met, he'd looked at John like that. Like a child opening a present at Christmas. His eyes full of starlight.

"I could go downstairs, make a pot of tea," Tara suggested. His voice was calculatedly cheerful. Paul, that idiot, was nodding and smiling. Smiling and nodding like it was bridge club.

Did he even know how to make tea? John thought unkindly. Didn't a man like that have people to do it for him?

John had made tea for Paul countless times in the kitchen just downstairs. He could do it blindfolded.

"I make tea for Paul all the time," Tara drawled. "We drink it in bed while flipping through art books. We laugh at you. At how repressed you are."

The look on his face was so congenial, his smile so winsome.

"What did you say?" John whispered, cold sweat prickling under his arms.

"I said would you like some tea as well, John?" His real voice just sounded different. The difference of a live band beside an over produced track. But it made no difference to John. He still heard Tara's taunt ringing in his ears.

"Yes, we laughed at you, " Paul said with his slow sweet smile. “We'd laugh at you while we fucked. It really got us off, it did." He looked over at John with that playful puppy manner, bounced up and down slightly in his seat on the bed.

John put his hands over his ears, screwed his eyes shut. He told himself Paul would never. It wasn’t real. 

  


_( **It was you! Fuck!** )_

__

  


Paul reached over and put his hands over John's, wrenched them from his ears.

"John. What's wrong with you, man? Have some tea. It'll do you good."

Tara was nodding along with him. It made John sick, that air of domesticity that surrounded them, the way they interacted, how attuned they were to each other. George had once made a similar comment about John and Paul. He had called them Siamese twins. ‘Do you fuck in tandem?’ he'd asked. Paul had laughed but John hadn’t. He’d pictured Paul pressed against him, his eyes screwed shut; his face flushed red, pleasure wracking his body. He’d silenced George with a glare. And then he’d made sure his new song hadn’t made the cut.

John grasped Paul's hands by the wrists, held him in place.

"No, I wouldn't like any fucking tea! What's wrong with you two half-wits? Paul, you look like someone beat the stuffing out of you. And all he can do is stand there holding his prick."

"Perhaps it's best to keep calm," Tara said in the soothing tone reserved for hysterical women and children.

"Oh, why don't you just piss off back to London, you silver spoon leprechaun! And watch them icy roads while you're at it!"

  


_(He didn’t notice that…_

_He didn’t notice that…_

_He didn’t notice that the lights had changed.)_

  


"John!" Paul said aghast. "Tara, he's off his head!" He half stood and then sat back down again. The bed let out a perverse squeal when he upset the rusty springs.  


"I can see that," Tara said shortly. He placed the paper bag on the bed between Paul and John. "You're not to take more than one every two hours. With water, Paul."

“I've got it from here." John scooped up the paper bag but didn't open it.

"I was speaking with Paul. You don't look like you've got anything. You look like you need a good night's sleep," Tara said firmly. He shot Paul a concerned look and Paul answered with a small shake of his head.

John jumped to his feet; his hands loose by his sides. "It's clear enough to me what's going on here. He was fine till you came on the scene, fancy-knickers," he shouted.

"No need to get nasty," Tara was cross but calm. He stood his ground, folded his arms over his chest.

"That's quite enough of that, John,” Paul said firmly. “You're not my mother. I'm quite capable of taking care of meself."

"Obviously!" John waved his hands in direction of Paul's face. "You're doing a splendid job!"

"You're not his girlfriend either, are you?" Tara said quietly. He looked straight at John as he said it. That grave look in his eyes, his mouth resolute.

And though by this point John knew better, his mind shut down and his muscles sprang to action. He rushed at Tara, slammed into him with an audible crack. He grabbed a fistful of the man's expensive cashmere jumper and pinned him against the wall.

"Say it again, you Irish cunt. Louder for the folks in the cheaper seats."

“What are you on about?” Tara shouted, his eyes were wide in terror. “I just said I’d make that pot of tea!”

Paul was at his side in a flash, he grabbed John's elbow and held it fast. His fingernails dug into John's skin leaving a scattering of half- moon markings like tribal scarification.

"Stop it! Bloody...stop it!" Paul hissed.

He wrestled John into his arms away from Tara, held him secure.

Tara looked on with an expression that John was too angry to analyse, perhaps fear and obscene sensationalism.

"He's...I'm sorry Tara...he gets like this..."

It wasn't the first time he'd heard Paul apologise for him. It wasn't the hundredth. He relaxed against Paul abruptly, exhaled violently. His breath caught in his chest, a rasping bitten-off sob and he stopped struggling to free himself.

Paul loosened his hold at once and his hand was soft on his shoulder, embracing rather than binding. He stroked John's chin with his thumb carelessly.

Against the wall, Tara ceased straightening his mussed clothes and hair and stared at them blatantly. His mouth open, his eyes wide. He made a small sound of shock and pity and hurt.

"There it is," he said softly.

The phone rang and broke the spell.

Paul let go of John and pulled Tara out from where he was pressed up against the wall. Glass crunched beneath Tara’s good Italian shoes.

“Stay here, John. I need to answer that in case it’s Dad.”

Paul bounded down the stairs with Tara in tow. He reached the phone just in time.

"Cyn!" Paul's voice drifted upstairs and John hurtled himself downwards to listen in on the conversation.

"Yes, John is here. I'm fine, thank you. Just a bit banged up and I chipped me tooth. Yeah. Mostly I feel foolish, you know?"

Tara was standing by a window smoking. When he saw John approach he shot him an apprehensive look.

"Yeah...yeah...Well, he arrived safe and sound...No, of course...Do you want to speak with him?"

John held out his hand to receive the phone but Paul shook his head.

"Alright...it's alright now, love...You too, Cyn. Love to Jules."

Tara held out his cigarette packet but Paul didn’t take it. He kept his eyes on John, a series of emotions flitting over his face, his beautiful mobile mouth moving soundlessly for a second before he spoke.

"She says you drove here on your own. She's been going mad with worry. Says you blew your mind out before driving here. You blew your mind out!" Paul took the pack of cigarettes from Tara and shook one out. Fumbled for a lighter and then seemed to give up, too angry to bother lighting the ciggie. “What the bloody hell were you thinking?"

Tara was studying a painting on the wall, twin dots of embarrassment blooming on his cheeks.

"How could you do this to me? You selfish prick. Can you see the headlines now? Not one but two Beatles in road accidents!” Paul spat.

“But I didn't..." John started to say. He stared at past Paul out the window. He could just about make out the blurry shape of his car.

  


_(Inside the socket of the beast’s skull._  


_Not a man but an appendage._

_Not a man._

_He was in the car but there was no driver.)_

  


John coughed. His skin goose-pimpled. "I didn't do it on purpose," he said weakly.

"I should bloody well hope not. Even you...even you can’t be that cavalier," Paul said in exasperation. 

He could feel the anger rolling off Paul in waves. Could feel the crackle in the air that preceded a major blow out. When Paul started shouting in earnest all bets were off.

John remained silent for once. It was coming back to him slowly. Snippets of a song he'd heard once and enjoyed. The bridge first and then bits of the first verse. He'd soared to his car as Cynthia called after him. All he'd been able to think was he had to get to Paul. He had to.

He felt icy fingers grip his insides. It hadn't been real. Si hadn't been real. He could usually shake away the visions with ease. Rain water beading on a plastic mac. But he'd spoken with Si. He'd been so real. But he hadn’t, had he? Because John had driven here alone. Alone and out of his head.

  


__

_(John! Please wait! I've spoken with George now and Paul's fine. Please, John! Please at least wait until...)_

__

  


It hadn't mattered. It hadn't mattered what Cyn called after him. He’d had to get to him. The thought his only constant. A mantra running on a loop endlessly in his mind.

John tucked his hands under his arms, at a loss what to do with them. He tried to mask the shock he felt at the realisation it had all been an illusion.

"Nothing happened. I knew what I was doing.” His voice lacked conviction.

"You must be joking. You don't know that, do you? You could have jumped out of the moving car because you thought you were a fucking bird! Cyn said she didn’t dare call anyone else. "

John could only shrug helplessly. "Nothing happened,” he repeated.

"Cyn? Oh. Your wife," Tara said, as if he'd only now realised who Paul had been talking to on the phone.

John’s mind went black. There was no space left in it for anything but the fury. The tape had cut off in the middle of the bar abruptly ending the song, the ending jagged and tuneless. He could no longer keep his temper in check.

"And where's your wife, Tara?" he snarled.

"Oh for the love of...!" Paul exclaimed, stepping between Tara and John though neither of them had moved an inch, they were simply staring at each other in blind rage.

“I think it’s best if you leave now after all, Tara,” Paul said shortly.

John lurched forward and Tara backwards just as Paul slid between them, placed his hand on John’s chest to stop him.

His stomach plummeted, his skin tingling where Paul touched him. Like an infestation of stars inside him. He could see them beneath his skin, bright swirling points.

"Are you sure?" Tara asked. His eyes were fixed on John's face as though he was afraid he might swallow Paul whole.

“I’m sure,” Paul said firmly. “Dad should be home soon anyway.”

"Not afraid to be alone with me, Paulie?" John sneered.

Paul's hand convulsed against his chest, he gripped a handful of John’s shirt.

"Go upstairs, John. For fuck's sake. Don't move, don't touch anything. Don't go near the bleeding window."

"I'm not going to jump," John said petulantly. "Besides, it isn't too far to fall. You forget I climbed that bloody drainpipe a thousand times."

Tara was still staring at him. John could see the thoughts written on his face, clear as day. He thought John was a beast. He thought John would hurt Paul.

  


_(He was right._

_John would hurt Paul, given half a chance.)_

__

  


"I haven't forgotten," Paul said sharply. His fingers hooked under the cloth of John’s shirt, brushing his skin. Stars by the thousands. Bright and blistering, feverish. They made their way through his veins: up, up, up, exploding in his brain, blinding him. He gasped out loud. Paul pushed him away impatiently.

“Just go upstairs, John. I’ll see Tara off. Try not to get yourself into any trouble.” He sounded resigned, his tone was gentle again. John wasn’t sure what was worse: the anger or the resignation.

Upstairs, John rushed to the window at once, lurked behind the curtain. He pulled his glasses out of his pocket and hastily put them on.

He spotted them in the street next to what he assumed was Tara’s car, a stylish piece of machinery, sleek and streamlined as the man himself. Paul was putting a hand on Tara’s arm, his whole posture apologetic. Tara was holding him at arms-length. John strained to hear what they were saying, their voices floating up from the street below.

"No need, Paul. I knew it from the start. I'm not a fool," Tara said.

Paul pulled on his arm in that boyish way that was at once irritating and charming.

"It's just. It's just that...I...he..." 

  


_(What?_

_What is it?_

_Tell me, Paul.)_

__  


"It's okay. It's alright, love," Tara said, so softly John almost missed it.  


He pulled Paul closer, took his face between his hands gently. Paul's hand came up to cradle the back of Tara's head.

It hurt like a wound being cauterised. John made himself look until he couldn’t bear to anymore. When he closed his eyes he saw them twined round each other. They were so close they might as well have been one being. Their mouths brushing together tenderly, over and over. Their hands met, palm to palm, like dancers locked in a minuet. There was poetry to their actions. It was like a well written symphony. When John kissed Paul in his head it was all tongues and teeth and spit. Dissonant chords. Like he wanted to devour him skin and bones.

  


_(Never could see any other way._

_Never could see any other way._

_Never could see any other way._

_Never could see any other way.)_

  


He wished he’d smashed Tara’s pretty face. He wished Tara would crash that fucking stupid car on his way back to London, wrap himself around a tree. John wanted to be the crash. Wanted to feel himself shatter and burn.

When he opened his eyes again Tara’s car was gone and Paul was standing at the doorway, one hand on his hip.

“You’re a wanker,” Paul said in his matter of fact way.

John opened his mouth and closed it again. There wasn’t much to add to that.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At last! Paul! I hope it didn't disappoint!
> 
> Thank you so much to my lovelies:
> 
> Emma! @swaying-daisies for proofreading and being lovely about the Tara stuff. It's always John and Paul, Paul and John for me but I kinda ship Paul and Tara now. That's cause of you!
> 
> Twinka, my dearest. Thank you so much for reading through it and finding ways for it to read smoother and better. Particularly the queer bit. Thank you for listening to me and generally being inspiring. I write so many things in the hopes of impressing you.
> 
> JaneScarlett thank you for proofreading despite your super hectic schedule (school and impersonating a Timelady...). I love you. 
> 
> Thanks as always to Single-Pigeon! My dear!
> 
> The songs used in this chapter are:
> 
> "Some People Never Know", Paul McCartney  
> "She's Leaving Home", The Beatles  
> "Oh! Darling", The Beatles  
> "A Day in The Life", The Beatles
> 
> There's one more chapter left! Thank you so much for reading! Please leave comments if you have a moment! I'd be ever so grateful.


	4. The Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’d wanted this for so long. He’d fantasised about it, argued with himself endlessly about it. He’d written songs about it. There had been times in the past where they had come close to addressing the matter but never like this.
> 
> The trip is the destination and the destination the trip.

John let the curtain fall back into place and turned to face Paul, a guilty little smile on his lips.

“I told you not to go near the window," Paul said, leaning against the door-frame. John couldn't tell if he was angry or not. He had his eyes fixed on John's face; his mouth was quivering as if he was on the brink of saying something wounding.

“I’m not going to fly out, Paul," he said with a strained laugh.

“Not if I have anything to say about it you won’t," Paul said darkly.

“It's nearly done now. It’s already wearing off,” he insisted.

“Just come away from there,” Paul groaned.

“I wasn’t…I only…I wasn’t thinking of the danger. I was just thinking…” John began.

“You just wanted to be here…I know that.” Paul’s expression softened.

John should have let well enough alone. But he couldn’t, couldn’t just let it lie. He’d seen the way they’d looked at each other.

"Why did you send Tara away if you're so awfully fond of him? You are… I…I can tell," he tried to make the words light and teasing but they came out pleading, stunted, stuttered.

"Because I need to have a lie-down and I can't trust you two not to gut each other while I'm asleep," Paul grumbled.

"Why didn't you send me away then?" John asked sulkily.

Paul simply stared for a while and then entered the room and lay down on the bed with a sigh.

"It's going to take another six hours till that stuff is really truly good and worn off, isn't it?"

"So that's it? How do you explain it to Cyn if I die? How do you explain it to the others?" John glared accusingly.

"Yeah. That's right, John. How can the Beatles exist without John Lennon? That's all I care about," Paul said harshly.

John walked over and sat on the edge of the bed gingerly, Paul's foot brushed his knee and he touched his fingertips to the line of his ankle tentatively. Paul didn't pull away.

“Do you really...care, then? Do you really...like me? Not just because of the music...me?" He cradled Paul's foot now, his thumb skimming over his Achilles heel, feather-light. He kept expecting the man to draw back, cringe from his touch but he didn't.

Paul laughed weakly from among the pillows; his dark hair framed his pale, bruised face.

"Yes, you silly nit. Yes, what's wrong with you? Of course I do. And Ringo and George. All of us do." He pressed the sole of his foot to John’s thigh, gently prodded him.

John leaned forward, shivering with uncertainty; put his hand on Paul's knee. His stomach flipped. Paul blushed pink; he slid backwards in bed, pulling his leg from John’s grasp.

"But you..." John said insistently, “you..."

"Yes. Yes! Is this still about Tara? Because you're making a huge fuss about...nothing...about...you needn't." Paul sat up and leaned forward.

"Well you could have just said. You could have...I don't know..."

"Spelled it out for you? Of course I bloody well like you. I...I...fuck. I wanted you here, not Tara. Not Jane. I...of course I like you..."

He’d crossed a line, Paul was vexed now. And yet he still couldn’t let it go. John pulled his legs up to his chest and wrapped his arms around his knees. He rested his chin on his knees moodily.

"You might have told me that straight," he murmured sullenly.

"I did, John. I did, more than once. I tell you all the time!" Paul exclaimed.

"Well, you can't have been that clear because...hold up...you're not...you're not angry with me? You are!" John said incredulously though he’d goaded Paul into this position intentionally.

He straightened, stretched his legs out on the bed, his feet against the pillows. Now they sat facing each other.

"You're the one who said it was fine! Stay in Weybridge. Stay with Cynthia and Julian! While you...with...with Tara!"

"Stop it! What was I supposed to do? Beg you? And that's quite enough about Tara! I wanted you here with me. Full stop. But, Christ! There's just no getting through to you, is there?" Paul cried. He reached forward, grabbed hold of John’s shoulders and shook him sharply.

"You can't possibly blame me!" John realised at once that he was shouting, matching Paul for volume. He wrenched himself out of Paul’s grasp, leaned against the bed-post; it dug sharply into his back.

"I was so tired. So tired of waiting for you to get your head out your arse! Tired of waiting for you to understand...to see..." Paul cried.

"So you did what?" John scoffed. He was trembling, his knuckles very white as he clenched his hands together. "You offered yourself to him instead?"

He wanted Paul to deny it. To plead with him to be sensible but instead he was looking at him with that cool, empty expression.

"For fuck’s sake, Paul!" He wanted to sound angry, even disgusted. To his disgrace, there were tears in his voice, a watery ripple of pain. He was heartbroken.

"You hypocrite," Paul hissed. "What about Brian? What’s wrong, Johnny?" His voice was tinged with scorn. He mimicked John's position, drew his legs up to his chin, feet crossed at the ankles, his hands rested on his knees. "You think I never wondered about that? The difference was I wasn't using Tara to get ahead professionally."

John's stomach plummeted. The dull flush of humiliation started at the back of his neck and spread through him like a rash. They'd never mentioned the trip to Spain before, not in this context. And like an unruly child John had thought he'd gotten away with it. He should have known Paul had merely been waiting for the right moment to throw it in his face.

"Bollocks. You were using him for something worse. You were using him to hurt me!" John cleared his throat but the words got stuck on the way up, came out stunted and raspy.

“I was using him…he was a laugh, all right? He’s a nice bloke. We have fun. And so what?" Paul lifted his shoulders defensively, his spine very straight. His lip arrogant, curled in the way that had once prompted John to call him Baby Elvis.

“So, I thought you cared about me!” John cried, his voice wavering.

“You sound like a child John! Never mind Brian. You’re married! You have a kid…” Paul hesitated, red blossomed in his cheeks. He looked down at John’s hands and then up again. There was a strange light in his eyes. John’s chest ached as he gazed at him.

“I know that,” John said quickly. He sucked on his lower lip trying to find the right words. “I’m not daft. I just thought…you and me…”

Paul looked at him expectantly.

“I always thought…if you…if you…it would be me.” John’s face was flushed with embarrassment. They had never spoken of it this plainly before. Whatever was between them had remained undefined for so long it felt unnatural to address it.

  


__

_( **Seems like all I really was doing,**_

__

**_Was waiting for you._** _)_

  


“Yeah,” Paul said with a sigh. “That’s what I thought too and then you went to Spain with Eppy.” He looked so despondent suddenly, with his bruised face and split lip.

“Nothing happened with Brian. It's not what you think,” John insisted. It wasn’t exactly the truth. It wasn’t a lie, either.

"Then nothing happened with Tara." Paul's face turned hard, his eyes like flint. His tone matched his eyes.

“It’s not a negotiation. Either something happened or it didn’t!” John countered.

“It didn’t. Not what you’re upset about at any rate.”

“And what am I upset about?” John demanded, folding his arms across his chest.

“You’ve made it into some naff romance. And you’re acting like a jealous bird!"

Wasn't it, though? Wasn't that what this was, a romance? He had heard the way Tara spoke Paul's name. Seen that tender farewell. As for himself, John had never known a more intense romance. This thing with Paul, this unrequited love affair.

“I _am_ jealous!” he roared like a wounded animal. They were sitting so close now their shoulders were nearly touching. He could count every one of Paul’s eyelashes. He could see the muscles jumping in Paul’s face. See how tightly wound he was, wound to the breaking point.

“Well, you’ve no right to be!” Paul exclaimed, throwing his hands up in irritation.

John caught the motion of his hands and misunderstanding, raised his own in defense and clipped Paul hard on the chin.

Appalled, John drew back when he saw Paul's face crumple and tears begin to leak from his eyes.

"Oh god. Oh, Paul...I didn't..." John babbled, starting to reach for the other man before letting his hand drop in horror. He felt ill.

After a beat John realised that Paul wasn't crying after all.

  


__

_(He was laughing, the bastard._

__

_He was laughing.)_

  


Paul collapsed on to the bed like a puppet whose strings had been cut. As if the amusement bubbling up out of him was too much for him to bear upright.

"Your face," Paul spluttered. "John...John...I'm fine."

The cheek of him! The cheek of that insufferable, childish, ridiculous, beautiful boy. John just stared at him, too shocked to speak.

"Are you high?" he just about managed to choke out.

"Likely," Paul admitted, still lying flat on his back, laughing too hard to sit up. “Come on! This is just too funny. We’re like the lovers in some melodramatic film, having a spat.”

For a moment John’s heart stopped. Paul had used the word _lovers_. And then the realisation hit him like the tide striking the shore. A cold, merciless rush, leaving ruination in its wake. John froze, a look of horror rigid upon his face.

“The state of you!” Paul raised himself up on an elbow, shuddering with mirth; he collapsed back onto the bed.

"Shut up!" John exclaimed. "Shut up. Oh shut up, you fucking idiot! You could have ..." But he couldn't go on because his voice cracked too badly. A shockwave tore through his body and he folded in on himself like a pocketknife.

"You could have died, Paul. Don’t you understand? You could have died on me. Like…just like her…Just like…You could have _died_!" he cried.

John felt lightheaded. The tears were coming down hard now; steady stream- not an artful welling of the eyes punctuated by a delicate sniffle- but real tears. The tempest, not a drizzle of summer rain. His nose was running like kid without a handkerchief. He wiped it with the back of his hand, beyond caring.

Paul watched him in amazement from where he lay on the bed. He placed a hand on John's knee awkwardly. Touched him like he was made of spun sugar. John pulled away, afraid that if he let Paul touch him he'd fly to pieces.

"Hey, no…no…no need for that," Paul murmured. He leaned over and pulled John down to his level so that they were lying face to face. John screwed his eyes shut. He couldn't afford to let himself believe this was real, that this really was Paul, warm, alive, gazing into his eyes with such excruciating tenderness.

"Look at me. Please," Paul pleaded.

He rested his forehead against John's, his hands coming up to tangle in John's hair. His mouth was close enough to kiss. John stifled a hysterical laugh. If this was an illusion it would kill him.

  


__

_(They say when a bird flies into your house through one window and out another it's a portent of death._

__

_Whose death?)_

  


"I'm right here. It's alright. It's just a couple of bruises," Paul whispered in that soothing voice that was for John alone. Paul pushed the straggling hair out of John's eyes, stroked his damp face.

"Please...Please, stop crying. I promise you, I'm alright."

That only made it worse. John was sobbing now, his whole body trembling. He was trapped in the paroxysm. No escape.

"Please, John."

"I can't...stop...I…" John gasped. He grabbed hold of the front of Paul's shirt, caught between pushing him away and pulling him closer. Paul took John's face in his hands and wiped it with his shirtsleeve.

"Stop it," John begged him weakly.

But Paul didn't. Under his breath he hummed a tune John had never heard before. Something sweet that reminded him of being rocked to sleep.

  


__

_(With my carnation hidden by the packages,_

_Long-time no see, baby._

_I’m carrying something.)_

  


Gibberish, nonsense lyrics. John knew exactly what he meant. He’d been carrying that torch for years.

  


__

_(I'm carrying something for you.)_

__

  


Then, to his shock, Paul pressed his lips to his forehead, soft as moth’s wings. Paul's arms came around him, pulling him more securely into his embrace. He kissed John's hair, his temple, his chin, the corner of his mouth. John gasped, parted his lips, on the verge of protesting, while tears and mucus streamed down his face and into his mouth. Paul didn’t seem to notice or else he didn't care, he didn't cease his gentle attentions. John floundered, struggled to sit up and pull away but there was nowhere to escape to in that narrow bed. Paul had John’s face grasped between his hands decisively. 

  


__

_( **Finally.** )_

__

  


Paul kissed him full on the mouth, his tongue sliding between his lips and against John’s, smooth as silk. John forgot to cry. His heart was pounding so hard he feared the reverberations might shatter his body. He only knew one thing. Paul's mouth was on his. He tasted of iodine, metal and smoke. He tasted of death and the end of the world.

One of his teeth had been chipped in the accident and John scraped its jagged edge with the tip of his tongue. The sting was delicious, he did it again and again. He was at once fully and painfully erect, his cock straining against his tight trousers.

Paul was gripping him so hard it hurt and he retaliated by deepening the kiss, forgetting about the split lip, the battered face. John's teeth caught the gash in Paul's upper lip and he tasted fresh blood. Paul let out a short cry of pain but didn't relinquish his stranglehold on John.

"Stay," he insisted when John tried to draw back.

"I've hurt you!" John whispered urgently.

Paul shook his head, shuddered against him, his eyes closed, his hands grasping the back of his shirt desperately.

"No! It's...it's...fuck...finally..." Paul exhaled, his breath shallow. "Fuck, John. Finally. You know how Iong I've wanted this to happen?"

John was shocked how intense Paul sounded, that edge of insanity in his voice. He shook his head in disbelief. He himself had wanted it since the day they first met.

  


__

_( **Seems like all I really was doing,**_

****

__

****

**_Was waiting for you._** _)_

  


"John. Do you understand? I've wanted this since before the Beatles."

The words made no sense, as though Paul were speaking another language entirely.

But part of him had always known it. Known that there was a secret world, a shadow world, in which he and Paul were lovers. A world they'd only touched upon. Where he knew the taste of Paul's mouth, the velvet of Paul's bare skin against his own.

All of John’s worlds converged at once. Paul was kissing him, a low, desperate moan escaping him as he pulled at John’s clothes in an unmistakable manner. The thought was exciting. He’d wanted this. He’d wanted this. Paul wanted him.

  


__

_(I want you so bad it’s driving me mad.)_

__

  


"I wanted this to happen. But I thought..." Paul began.

It felt like attempting to breath underwater. Without Paul’s mouth on his own, John was drowning. He took Paul’s face between his hands and kissed him again, gasping for air.

"I thought you..." Paul started again when at last they broke the kiss.

So many wasted years. Acres of them, stretching out behind them like a barren field. The land salted. He unbuttoned Paul's shirt, slid it off his shoulders. Time slowed to a halt. Paul's breath shuddered from him in short gasps, caught in his throat.

"Oh, Christ," Paul said, a spasm of pleasure flickered across his face.

Beneath the shirt Paul’s chest was a mass of bruises. John slid down, pressed his lips to the livid purple roses and dark hair that bloomed there. Paul hissed softly but his hands gripped John, holding him in place, pressing him closer.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” John whispered against his skin.

“I don’t care,” Paul said impetuously, his hands were knotted at John’s back. He wrapped his legs around John’s waist. John could feel him hard through the fabric of his trousers. His stomach tightened with lust. The field of their missed opportunities sprang to life, wave after wave of green.

“I thought you didn’t…” Paul tried again.

"I thought you didn’t," John interrupted him.

Despite his desperate attempts to be gentle, John couldn’t force his hands to cooperate. It seemed to John the more he hurt him the more it inflamed Paul's ardour. He pushed him back into the lush grass, into the fertile field that had come up around them violently. Paul looked up expectantly, eyes hazy, lids heavy, his lips parted, he was laced with opium, surrounded by green nodding buds. And while John hovered above him, hesitant, uncertain of how to proceed he unfastened John's trousers and slid them down his hips.

“I did,” Paul exhaled.

He undid Paul’s trousers, his fingers fumbling under his briefs against his erect cock. His mind was whirling. He paused a moment before taking him in hand. “Fuck, Paul,” he whispered. For a moment they just stared at each other.

"Off," Paul said, suddenly impatient. "Off, off take everything off!"

He wrestled with John's shirt, scattering buttons, undressed him in a feverish manner. Here and there scarlet blooms unfurled, seeping through the green like blood on silk. Before long they had discarded their clothes. They lay naked in a field of poppies.

"Beautiful," Paul breathed. John looked up. The meadow was a sea of red. A strong wind shook the blooms creating the impression of scarlet waves. They were drowning in petals. John was drowning in Paul.

"You are," John declared.

He put his head to Paul's chest, gripped by the fierce desire to hear his heartbeat. He needed proof that he was alive, that he was really here with him. Paul angled his head forward to kiss John's neck. He was murmuring something unintelligible, peppered with soft sounds of keen pleasure. He didn’t hear a heartbeat when he placed his head against Paul’s chest. Instead, he heard a bassline.

  


__

_(I want you so bad._

__

_I want you so bad._

_It's driving me mad._

_It's driving me mad.)_

  


He slid a hand down Paul's side hesitantly as if he was afraid that he might scatter like powdery petals if handled too roughly.

"I won't break, John," Paul breathed in his ear.

Paul pressed the tip of his tongue to John's earlobe and a stab of lust caught John low in the stomach, startling him with its ferocity. Paul reached down and grasped his cock without decorum, running his thumb over the slick tip. John grasped the poppy stems in his hands, crushing the delicate blooms in his passion. The sharp scent of chlorophyll pervaded the air. John put a hand over Paul’s encouragingly.

"You do want me," Paul gasped, barely suppressing a small laugh of nerves, "you really do."

He tightened his grip, stroking John slowly, deliberately, drawing it out.

"I do," John admitted, his breath coming in bursts and fits. "God. I do…I want you. I’ve wanted you. Ever since... Always."

He took hold of Paul’s upper arm. Tomorrow there would be a number of John shaped bruises to add to his collection. Paul's right hand was at his neck, his grip possessive, holding him in place.

"So why didn't you ever do anything about it?" Paul asked, voice thin, strangled with lust. He grabbed a fistful of John's hair and pulled it till he cried out.

"Fuck!" John fumbled inelegantly between them for Paul's cock. He stroked downward, nails scratching at his balls, squeezed them perhaps a little harder than he should have, eliciting a drawn-out moan of pleasure from Paul. "Was this what you wanted?"

He was shocked at how quickly he found the rhythm that had Paul shivering and writhing beside him, his body stained with grass and dark blue sooty pollen from the poppies. Blindly, he sought Paul's mouth and kissed him till he tasted blood again.

"Yes!" Paul answered belatedly, gasping into the kiss.

Their hips crashed against each other as they thrust into each other’s fists. Then all at once Paul drew back.

“No,” he said, his words slurred with need. “I want…let me…”

Paul rubbed his face against John's chest awkwardly, like a playful, gawkish puppy. Nosed John's hip bone tentatively. He looked up once, wide-eyed and uncertain, a shy smile dancing on his lips. He slowed his hand on John’s prick and all at once two things were pointedly clear.

One: what it was Paul intended to do next.  
Two: Paul was terrified.  


John could feel him trembling and he reached a hand down to touch a finger to his swollen lips. But before he could, Paul bent his head, shook the petals from his dark hair, grabbed hold of John’s hips and took his cock in his mouth. John's eyes rolled back in his head. He could feel the slight scratching of Paul’s chipped tooth, the soft wetness of his tongue as he gently licked the tip. He could hear the huff of Paul’s breath as he breathed through his nose. And then he took him further, gasping as John filled him. A wind ravaged the field, beheading poppies where it blew. Red-orange petals showered down upon them. The pleasure was shattering; it shattered the dream.

It felt as though he had fallen back into his body from a great height. Struggling to catch his breath he opened his eyes. He was in Paul’s room on Forthlin Road. It was late afternoon, what remained of the sun came in dusty and dull through a crack in the curtains. There were no flowers. There was no field. They were tangled together on Paul’s narrow bed. The blankets had been kicked to the floor with their clothes. They were naked. Paul’s mouth was wrapped round his cock. He was sucking him slowly, haltingly, moaning softly as he did. Inside John desire was tangled up with disgust. This was Paul. This was really happening. He felt panic like a terrified small sharp-clawed creature trying to tear its way out of his breast. Panic and a throbbing, insatiable need. He’d wanted this for so long. He’d fantasised about it, argued with himself endlessly about it. He’d written songs about it. There had been times in the past where they had come close to addressing the matter but never like this. His body was reacting, his hips angling upwards of their own accord; he started to thrust into Paul’s mouth. He couldn’t do it like this. He needed it to stop. He needed to think.

John went still, his erection softening abruptly. He withdrew entirely, curled himself into foetal position with his back to Paul and froze.

Paul let out a whimper of confusion and for a long moment he said nothing at all. John could feel Paul’s hand hovering over his shoulder but he didn’t touch him. When at last he spoke his voice was steady, sincere.

“John, are you okay?”

He couldn’t answer, he couldn’t move.

“Please love, have I done something wrong? I thought you wanted this.”

Paul’s hand was in his hair stroking him gently and awkwardly. He put his arms around John from behind, pressed his chest to John’s back.

“Was it too much at once?” he asked.

John tried to shift without pushing Paul out of the bed. There wasn’t much room to move with two of them on the narrow mattress but he just about managed. He pressed his eyes shut and released his breath in one long shaky stream.

“Are you still tripping?” Paul asked softly.

John shook his head. “No…Yes… Don’t know. Don’t think so. It’s really you,” he managed to say. “Not a dream. It’s you.”

“Yeah,” Paul laughed. “It’s me alright.”

“You could have died, Paul. I…part of me…I thought you were dead.”

“But I didn’t do... I wasn’t… I told you. I didn’t die. See?” He took John’s hand and placed it over his heart. Now John could feel his heartbeat, strong and erratic.

“But you could have…I…I could have killed you. I still might.” He couldn’t quash the hysteria. Couldn’t seem to get a hold on himself.

“What nonsense is this? Hmmm? What’s this talk?”

“I kill them, Paul. Uncle George, Stu…Julia. It’s me. I love them and they die.” He realised with a horrified start that he’d just implied he _loved Paul._

Paul laughed gently. “It’s not you, John. It’s not. Things…these things just happen. And anyhow, I’m not dying on you. I’m not going anywhere.”

John shook his head. This was the truth. If he knew nothing he knew this. He was poison. They died because of him.

“Do you need me to swear it? I swear it. I’m not leaving you.”

When he felt his muscles loosen one by one he realised he’d been tensing them. The knot in his stomach was unravelling. He wanted to stop in this moment. Like a scratch in vinyl. He wanted to hear Paul say those words over and over and over again.

  


__

_(I’ll never leave you alone._

__

_I’ll never leave you alone._

_I’ll never leave you alone.)_

  


“Swear it,” he demanded, though Paul just had. He reached for Paul and grabbed the nearest part of him which happened to be his knee.

“I do. I swear it. I’ll never leave you,” Paul repeated, he took hold of John’s shoulders and shook him once. “God, you’re impossible, you are.”

John nodded. He knew it. But it didn’t matter now. He was with Paul, naked, alone.

John had always imagined when it happened, it would be like the proclamation at a wedding ceremony.

“I’ll never leave you,” John parroted, to seal the deal. It felt like a puzzle piece had fallen into place. He pulled Paul into his arms roughly and kissed him hard on the lips.

The kiss was the vow.

Paul groaned against John’s mouth. “I never know what’s what with you,” he complained but John could feel his smile against his lips. He pushed Paul back against the pillows, straddled him and licked the line of his throat; he could feel his pulse jump staccato, the stubble rasped beneath his tongue. John's nerve-endings fizzed like firecrackers. Despite his pretty face and long lashes, Paul was irrefutably masculine. And John’s cock was so hard he could barely stand it.

“You love it. It turns you on,” John whispered. He pressed himself against Paul, felt the other man stiffen in turn, “see.”

Paul turned his head to the side away from John, blew out his breath in exasperation. “That’s just a spontaneous physical reaction, that. Doesn't mean anything.”

John rolled over the side of the bed and they tumbled to the ground, Paul fell on top of him, his head connecting with John's chest with a loud smack.

“You fucking idiot!” Paul exclaimed, his breath shallow. He struggled to pull away, perhaps to stand up but John held him in place against his chest.

“A minute ago you were worried I was dead. Now you’re hell-bent on breaking me neck.” His tone was so cross, John loosened his grip for a second and Paul rolled off him and onto the pile of their clothes. He pulled a shoe out from under him and chucked it at the door.

"Wanker," Paul said under his breath. He scraped his nails down John’s side, digging them into his skin till he hissed and laughed with pain and pleasure.

He buried his face in the space between Paul’s shoulder and neck. “Shhh,” John said against his skin. “I want to make you come.”

Paul groaned. "You can't charm me, I'm immune."

John dipped his head downward, kissed the head of Paul's cock, licked down the shaft as Paul shivered and moaned. It felt religious, as though he was worshipping the man with his mouth.

"Seems that way, doesn't it?" John teased, his voice was hoarse. He felt Paul grope blindly for his cock, grasp it clumsily but he shifted away. He needed his wits about him for this next.

Before Paul could answer he took him in his mouth. Only the tip of him at first, carefully, because he was uncertain of where his teeth should go, his tongue. He was afraid he'd gag, spoil the moment. His stomach was tying itself into knots. Absurdly, he felt a rush of competitiveness; if Paul could do it, so could he, and better.

Paul tasted of salt and aspirin, bitter and slightly numbing. He smelled of sweet sweat and bruised plants, he smelled like a man. There was nothing unnatural about the way he filled John's mouth, hard, urgent; his hips jerking awkwardly as he pushed into him. John had to grab him hard to keep him from choking him with his eagerness.

He came quicker than John had imagined it, and fiercer, his whole body arching upwards. The sound he was making, a low, weak whimper, drove John out of his mind with yearning. Though he'd known what to expect, he was so startled when Paul's come filled his mouth that he coughed and spat some of it out before managing to swallow hastily. It tasted at once strange and comforting.

Paul slumped against him, spent, his body flushed and boneless.

“John,” he murmured deliriously. “Oh fuck, John.”

He had made Paul come. He’d come in his mouth. John was so aroused he ached with it. He felt himself teetering dangerously close to orgasm already. He couldn't imagine he would last long; the slightest thing might set him off. John shut his eyes, tried to force his body to calm down. He'd be mortified if he came all over Paul before he'd even been properly touched despite the fact that the other man hadn't lasted more than a few minutes himself.

A sharp bang sounded from downstairs and Paul let out a short, fevered giggle. John's heart leaped to his throat.

"What was that?" he whispered hoarsely.

“Nothing, probably just a draft," Paul replied, his voice dipping low to match John's.

"What if...what if your dad's come home and he..."

  


__

_(His cold, dead eyes staring down at where they lay curved together on the floor._

_His hiss of disgust._

_Paul chose John._

__

_Come what may.)_

__

__  


After a beat Paul rolled half onto John to look into his face. He was smiling slyly but John could see that his eyes were wide and dark with momentum. John's hand had strayed to adjust his cock, still hard, aching for release. He felt Paul reach for him, his fingers tight over John's own.

“What if your dad…” John started again.

"Then he’ll see us in here together, won’t he? He’ll see I'm completely besotted with you," Paul whispered in John's ear.

  


__

_( **I know. I know that you and him…You and Paul…** )_

__

  


 

That was all it took.

The earnest timbre of Paul's voice, his choice of words, the way his lips brushed John's earlobe, it was all too much. He couldn't stop himself from coming all over his hand and Paul's. His heart labouring like mad, breath coming in gasps, for a moment everything froze and he was suspended in time. And there was only John and Paul. Paul and John. Nothing else.

Paul curled against him, his hand resting on his chest, his fingers were sticky, he drew patterns against John's skin absently. John told himself that he was drawing hearts and arrows. He was drifting, finally at peace, Paul's head heavy on his shoulder, when suddenly he felt that pang of dread like a dull knife twisting in his gut. He choked inside, his mind scrambling to stay rational. Struck by vertigo, he pulled Paul into his arms, gripping him tightly as if he might steady the spinning world.

"Ow, John...too rough," Paul laughed, flailing in John's embrace. "What now? You daft lad, you."

"Swear you'll never leave me," he demanded yet again. His voice came out all broken glass and swollen emotion. 

Paul went still in his arms. He propped himself up on his elbow to look into John’s eyes. He didn't hesitate. He didn’t sound irritated that John needed to hear it once more. Didn’t chide him or hedge flirtatiously.

"I swear."

  


__

_(Believe me when I tell you_

__

_I'll never do you no harm)_

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The trip is the destination. And we've arrived at the conclusion of this one dear readers.
> 
> I really enjoyed writing this one. It's been very close to my heart for a while. It started in a chat discussion in January and I sent the first paragraph I wrote of it, the scene with John crying, to Single-Pigeon's skype. I was writing at work. Well past midnight because it was a late day and then went on to have beer with colleagues. So then I was writing drunk. Single-Pigeon got the first rough dialogue, with John crying and Paul confessing he'd wanted him since before the Beatles peppered with spelling mistakes and typos. And here it is now. A full fic, all grown up.
> 
> Songs used in this chapter are:
> 
> "Real Love", The Beatles
> 
> "I'm Carrying", Paul McCartney 
> 
> "I Want You (She's so heavy)", The Beatles
> 
> "Oh! Darling," The Beatles (slightly altered)
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you to the beautiful humans who helped me write this! I really couldn't have done any of it without you.
> 
> Emmmma. @swaying-daisies for proofing and the Tara posts and telling me early on that she would love to read this story. 
> 
> Of course Single-Pigeon. This last chapter must have really grated on your nerves. Parts of the last scene were resent up to 10 times with minimal corrections. I'm so grateful to you for being so supportive.
> 
> JaneScarlett for reading the chapter on the train on the way to a con even though (because) it's pretty much porn. Thank you darling.
> 
> Twinka. You're the magic that holds the sky up from the ground. (to quote Ben Folds Five)  
> I couldn't have done any of this without your eye for characterisation and loving attention to detail. I do it just to reach you.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who read it and left me notes saying they loved it and they enjoyed the trip. I'm so glad to have contributed something that resonated with you. Let me know how you liked the end!

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was written for the Mclennon Big Bang 2017. Thank you to the mods for extending the deadline.
> 
> This fic is based on a real event:
> 
> December 26th 1965 "Paul McCartney suffered a moped accident while visiting his family in Liverpool.
> 
> McCartney fell from his moped and chipped a front tooth. He also cut his lip and was left with a scar.  
> ...  
> Also on the night time ride was Tara Browne, McCartney's friend. Browne was the Guinness heir whose death later inspired John Lennon to write the opening lines of A Day In The Life." 
> 
> \- from the Beatlesbible 
> 
>  
> 
> [ more here ](http://www.beatlesbible.com/1965/12/26/paul-mccartney-moped-accident-liverpool/)
> 
>  
> 
> I wanted to explore John's reaction to the accident, given all the loss he suffered in his life and his close relationship to Paul.
> 
>  
> 
> I wrote most of it at work on my phone. I work very long hours in a kitchen so imagine me standing there typing into my pathetic Samsung while cooking 5 things at the same time and plating someone's lunch.  
> I have to thank the amazing people without whom I couldn't have written any of this.
> 
> Emma! @swaying-daisies. You were so encouraging even if it's not your headcanon! Thank you! Thank you for all the Tara info and generally being a sweetheart.
> 
> Single-Pigeon lets me park my paragraphs in her Skype while I write at work. Sometimes I send her multiple versions of the same passage until I get it right. Thank you so much!!! I can't write without you. Also thank you for all the fun French Boy chats.
> 
> Twinka my sweet. You really carried so much of this story. It's like you raised each passage from a seedling to a tree. You gave such an excellent eye for pattern and flow. You really push me to be a better writer. I adore you.
> 
> JaneScarlett, my darling. Thank you so much for the beta. And listening to all my moaning and whinging. I love you. 
> 
> Thank you to Ahumouroussuggestion! thank you for the summary art! It's beautiful! [ see it here](https://ofyellowandgreen.tumblr.com/post/160436969419/they-say-when-a-bird-flies-into-your-house)
> 
>  
> 
> I quoted quite a few songs in this first chapter: 
> 
> Oh! Darling, Strawberry Fields, Julia, Don't Let Me Down, I'm Only Sleeping, All My Loving
> 
> Some of them were written after this story takes place. That was intentional. 
> 
> I wanted to be as authentic as I could be without trying acid. Thanks to Gabor and Julia for describing it to me.  
> If it doesn't seem that authentic I apologise. I did use some creative licence.
> 
> No matter what it sounds like now, no one is dead. And we're getting to Paul eventually. Keep reading darlings.


End file.
